Marc Munroe Dion: If you must fight, use your fists

Marc Munroe Dion

Wednesday

Apr 29, 2009 at 12:01 AMApr 29, 2009 at 1:47 AM

Like many, I’ve watched the video of and read about the recent “fight” in front of a local hot-dog joint. I put “fight” in quotation marks because I’ve watched enough fights to know that what happened in front of a South Main Street hot-dog joint was more of series of disorganized beatings than anything I’d call a fight.

Like many, I’ve watched the video of and read about the recent “fight” in front of a local hot-dog joint. I put “fight” in quotation marks because I’ve watched enough fights to know that what happened in front of a South Main Street hot-dog joint was more of series of disorganized beatings than anything I’d call a fight.

Oddly enough, this wasn’t the first “fight” I’ve ever seen in this neighborhood. A number of years ago, I walked away from holiday fireworks in Kennedy Park and, as I left my parking space on Division Street, I saw in my rearview mirror a similar brawl break out. I’m not the most sensible guy in the world so I pulled into the next parking spot and watched the brawl. That one wasn’t very good, either.

Of course, it is fairly crude to critique street fights as though they were boxing matches.

Still, a relatively crude sense of humor is a handy tool to have if you live in a city where the unemployment rate is over 16 percent. If I was serious about serious things, I’d have to go live in a small town where people get worked up when the library gets a new book.

But I do have questions about the recent taped “fight.”

I noticed someone on that tape going after another guy with a metal rod. Another guy picks a broken bottle as his weapon of choice.

One of my questions is, if you hit a guy with a metal rod and he goes down, how do you know you’ve won? Maybe if you’d hit him with your fist, he’d have blinked a bit and then torn you apart.
Of course, if you’re the guy with the metal rod, you dread the answer to that question.

I mention these things because I know how young men think. I was a young man once, back when dinosaurs and Chevy Vegas roamed the Earth and, like most young men, I fought. Like most young men, I never fought over anything important, either.

Still, young men fight the way young goats butt. It’s natural.

And I don’t want to get into full “old man mode” and start describing the gentlemanly, “good fun” fights of my youth where, as soon as the mayhem was over, “we shook hands and were buddies again.” Sure, that happened, but even in hindsight’s rosy glow, I know it wasn’t the norm.

And like all young men, I bragged about my fighting, the way all of us did. We bragged about the imaginary things we did with imaginary girls, too. Some men in their 30s, 40s and 50s are still living that way, though they’re looking mighty foolish.

I find it hard to envision how you brag about hitting a guy with a metal rod, or impaling his face with a piece of jagged bottle glass. Aren’t you just admitting you couldn’t whip the guy?

By now, many of my readers who are nonviolent by conviction or who have never been young and male are fairly disgusted with me.

But I’m not an advocate of violence. I just know it exists, particularly in young men. It’s one of the reasons young men make better soldiers than guys my age, or at least more willing soldiers.

If you think about it, wouldn’t you be less frightened by the sight of two guys, face to face, fighting with their fists than you are by the sight of 10 clowns whaling hell out of each other with whatever weapon comes to hand?

Sure you would. Me too.

I don’t know if the guys who did the street brawling are reading this (what’s your bet?) but if they are, here’s a note to them all.

Younger brothers, you blew it. You looked like punks. Two on one? Three on one? Weapons? Hitting someone who is down?

You’re not tough. You’re not tough at all.

I hate to tell you guys to square off one-on-one because that’s encouraging violence and that, as many people will tell you, is wrong.

What I will tell you, younger confused brothers, is that from what I saw, you don’t have anything to brag about.

Marc Munroe Dion is a reporter for The Herald News. E-mail him at mdion@heraldnews.com.

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